"Kids are dumb because they're not learning the essentials"

[Seifer]

That's the problem that seems to be plaguing adults today. I can calculate speed no problem: time= distance/speed, speed=distance/time and distance=speed x time.

I honestly can't tell if you're being a smart-ass or not.

I didn't mean actually calculating speed into a math problem, I meant simply taking it into consideration when you're planning a trip. If you know it takes about 40 minutes to drive somewhere with relatively easy traffic (and driving within the speed limit), then if it's close to 5 pm and everyone is on the road, you can safely say you'll have to allow yourself more time to get there.

Little kids don't understand that, and it does take practice to be able to solve an everyday problem like that.

[protege]

Neither really existed at my school when I was in high school. Part of the problem as I saw it was how many times they taught history. I lost track of how many grades had world history. Each time starting with the American Revolution and moving on.

Same at my school. We'd start from about 1492 or 1620, slowly up to 1776, 1812, the Civil War, etc. and then gloss over the rest. Very little attention was spent on WWI, WWII, and most of the 20th Century. Never mind that several events *in* that century changed history. Other history classes seemed to center around Rome and Greece...and very little else. Of all the history classes I sat through, I don't even remember hearing about Vietnam until my junior year of high school. I couldn't really ask my dad about it either--even though he served, he wouldn't talk about it.

[fireheart17]

We covered WWI and WWII in school (I actually preferred covering WWII) as well as a huge chunk of Australian history (starting from the first round of explorers, then Matthew Flinders charting our coast along with Nicholas Baudin, then Captain Cook and so on and so on)

I think my parents didn't realise it, but my sister and I wound up learning a fair bit from our trip to Ballarat aside from how NOT to pan for gold (they do a show called Blood on the Southern Cross which is about the Eureka Stockade)

[jackfaire]

Honestly, I never understood why people think reading, writing, and arithmetic are somehow going to magically make a child smarter.

The first time an adult told me that theory I told them, not being a smart ass I was just being naively honest, that it clearly didn't work since so many people seem to thing that Arithmetic starts with an R.

[Seifer]

The first time an adult told me that theory I told them, not being a smart ass I was just being naively honest, that it clearly didn't work since so many people seem to thing that Arithmetic starts with an R.

I have a feeling that "The Three R's" saying originated in the south. We like to drop random vowel sounds down here, and the only way anyone could think arithmetic starts with an 'r' is if they drop the 'a' sound at the beginning.

[jackfaire]

I have a feeling that "The Three R's" saying originated in the south. We like to drop random vowel sounds down here, and the only way anyone could think arithmetic starts with an 'r' is if they drop the 'a' sound at the beginning.

Most people up here said it without the A when they were talking about the Three Rs but I was a smart kid and seeing adults make dumb mistakes or what looked like dumb mistakes made it hard to trust their intelligence it's like having someone lie to you and then being asked to trust them again.

[Jetfire]

My mom is an English/History teacher, teaching Grade 11/12 now.

Her opinion for teaching history is to focus on the events and not the dates; with how connected the world is nowadays, knowing that Event X happened on ExactDateY isn't as important as knowing about the event, and how it fits into the big picture; the exact date when needed is just a Google search away.

One of the projects she has her students do is a group project, where each group has a decade (between 1900 and 2000 ), and they have to research the big events of that decade and present it. It's proven very effective in her experience, and really gotten the kids interested in what was going on then.

She also does things like play some of the older music from the time periods and using her own experience to explain what the world was like back then, and the kids are fascinated about it; especially when she can draw in current events occasionally. (I'm constantly emailing her links from news sites and blogs about current events so she can be kept up to date on some of the bigger things going on nowadays and thread them in to her discussions)

On the English side, she doesn't do Shakespeare any more (after 40 years teaching, she's sick of the Bard ), but she does do a selection of novels, some of them written within the past 50 years or less even. She encourages writing, and covers the basic skills people need (Resume writing, letter writing, report writing, etc... ), but tends not to get too hung up on long essay writing. (I tend to hear less about her English classes since she likes to talk about the History/Social studies classes more)

Speaking more generally, while the Three Rs are important, teaching them in isolation doesn't work. History and the Social Sciences teach you what is going on in the world, how we got here and why we got here. Sciences teach you how the world works and how to figure out how the world works. The Health classes (Phys Ed, Home Ec, Shop, etc...) teach you how to survive in the world and IMO are woefully underappreciated nowadays. I know back in Grade 9 (back in '93 or so), I had 4 classes, Cooking, Sewing, Metal Working and Wood Working, and they've all given me a good foundation for living. Granted I don't need to weld anything, and I rarely sew, but the basics skills are still there, helping me when I need to put a button back on, or wire up my speakers, or even just putting together furniture.

[jackfaire]

In more recent decades Pop Culture can point out differences in time periods too.

For example shows when I was a teen the kids that liked and knew about computers were all uber nerds and "losers" in the shows. A decade later the kids who have no internet presence are the nerds and "losers"

It's a fascinating study in how changing technology can be treated by different generations.

[fireheart17]

And would you look at that, an article today about it:

http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/n...-1226257099948

Discuss.

[blas87]

Fire safety can always be taught during Fire Safety Month, same as our yearly Severe Weather Safety training that's mandatory in schools and workplaces in the springtime around here.

Though outside the US, I'm not sure if those months are really observed as such.

[fireheart17]

Though outside the US, I'm not sure if those months are really observed as such.

Not so much I'm afraid.

In my state at least, in any semi-rural, rural or remote area, you are meant to have a bushfire plan. Not sure if it's a legal thing or if the local councils want it, but I do know that a friend of mine needed to make one when she lived in a semi-rural area. Families need to do it.

In terms of schools that are considered to be "country" schools and any semi-rural schools that aren't country, all need to have a bushfire plan. (for instance, there's a school that's maybe 20km away from me, which falls in the Education Department's "metro" guidelines, but has a bushfire plan) Usually the plan is that in the event of certain high risk days, either school is closed or kids are taken home earlier. (and DECS don't force the kids to make up for this unlike snow days)

Recently, there's been talk of an autism-only school opening in my state. This I don't see a problem with, given that DECS have dropped the ball in some cases. (for instance, a lot of special schools aren't fully equipped to deal with those students, and DECS Special Classes only take 8-12 students at a time. The disability units usually cater for up to 75 students, are poorly located, and the criteria for them is stricter. There's a lack of support for mildly autistic/aspergers students) The school is going to be parent-owned and run for the time being, with the government providing funds.

This had me thinking.

If people feel that the current education system isn't providing students with the adequate level of education, why don't those complainers open their own school that only teaches those 3 R's and nothing else?

[Lace Neil Singer]

For me history was awful, just memorizing dates, when I got older and started reading historical novels(as in actual history about actual things), I got excited about the very same things that had bored me to death a few years prior.

I pity you... cuz I had an absolutely fantastic history teacher who taught history in a way that made it come alive. Instead of reams of dates, she made it sound like enthralling stories and played games with us. Yeah, I know; a lot of people wouldn't think that you can play games about history, but she managed it; when we were learning about witch hunts, we played a game where we were each assigned a character and got to act out an accusation and a trial of a so called "witch". When we were learning about the second world war, and studying Nazi Germany and the persecution of the Jews, the teacher divided us up into two groups; blondes with blue eyes were classed as Nazis and the others as Jews, and said that the blondes could do whatever they liked and the others had to take it. Then she had us talk about how it felt.

Thing is, history can be made interesting, and it all depends on the teacher. Conversely, I hated geography at school cuz I had a seriously boring teacher. For those who've read the Harry Potter books, my old geography teacher was basically Professor Binns; he'd just stand by the blackboard and drone on and on and on for hours, sending the class into a stupor. However, geography no doubt can be made into an interesting subject with the right teacher, just like history... but the wrong teacher can make it into a yawnsome subject.

[bex1218]

We played trivia games in my history classes. Or bingo games. Also watched movies that depicted what we were learning about (fiction of course).

There wasn't much for my English classes. It was all read and watch the movies for the books or stories we read. As much as I loved that, my writing skills suck.

[fireheart17]

We played trivia games in my history classes. Or bingo games. Also watched movies that depicted what we were learning about (fiction of course).

I plan on using Horrible Histories as a teaching tool-the 2009 one, not the cartoon series.

There wasn't much for my English classes. It was all read and watch the movies for the books or stories we read. As much as I loved that, my writing skills suck.

My Year 11 English class was mostly that. My Year 12 English class was half that, half contextual stuff. I honestly preferred the Year 12 class.
Basically what happened was that my class wound up being over-enrolled, so they came up with an idea: they split the class into two but with a twist. Each teacher was going to offer a different option for a particular component of the course and we would get a chance to pick which one we wanted.
When it came time for the books, films and plays, we watched and read both options, then picked which one we wanted to do further study on.

We had a choice of The Lovely Bones and Of Mice and Men for books, Sleepers and The Shawshank Redemption for films and Educating Rita and some other play for the play. I initially offered to read the part of Rita for one scene since we were rotating them around. My English teachers were so impressed that they let me read Rita the whole way through I even outshined the drama students in my class and the English teacher asked me if I'd ever taken drama at the school before! (I honestly had considered it in Year 11)